


Shelter

by lakeghost



Category: Being Human (UK)
Genre: 1950s, Blood Drinking, Canon Compliant, F/M, Family Drama, Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture, Love at First Sight, M/M, Other, Restraints, Slow Burn, bonus Pearl with a pulse!, these tags make this sound much more fun and kinky than it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-26
Updated: 2018-09-26
Packaged: 2019-07-17 22:05:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16104758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lakeghost/pseuds/lakeghost
Summary: A little bit of backstory for the other trinity.





	Shelter

**Author's Note:**

> I should really be over it at this point, but I'm still in love with this damn show.
> 
> I'm convinced that getting Pearl to move in was just a way for Leo to improve what had to have been the most annoying flatmate situation.

“I haven’t been on many dates recently,” Leo explained. “Being new in town hasn’t made it easy. But I keep busy.”  
He glanced across the table at the woman, backlit by the soft yellow light of the restaurant. She smiled back.  


“Busy with work?” she queried.  


“Something like that. I took over at the barber shop – you know – but business isn’t exactly booming. I’ve been working some odd jobs to make ends meet.”  


“That explains the stains on your shirt then.” Pearl laughed a bit as she gestured at the rust-colored flecks on his collar. Leo recalled the inciting incident and faltered. Pearl noticed his face drop and rushed in to cover. “I didn’t mean to offend – honestly. I can just get a bit picky about things when I’m nervous – trying to make everything “just-so” and that.” She tested a smile.  


“No worries – my mind’s somewhere else is all.” He leaned closer, conspiratorially. “Besides, you have lipstick on your teeth.”  


Pearl gasped and rummaged through her purse for a mirror. She rolled her eyes and slapped Leo’s hand when she found no smear. “Bastard!” She hissed with a grin.  


“I couldn’t resist, you’re too perfect.” He returned a coy smile. The brief feeling of her hand on his, that human contact, lingered on his skin. He made a move to place his palm on her arm, tentative. Pearl raised an eyebrow, then brought her hand to his, trapping him.  
Leo stayed collected as he marveled in the gentleness of the gesture. “How would you like to come round my place for a coffee? It’s bit late to be walking home on your own, anyway.” He prayed he sounded suave and not desperate for human contact.  


Pearl leaned back and fussed with her necklace. She offered a sly smile. “Do you realize you come on a bit strong?”  


“I figured there’s no point in wasting time. You never know what’ll happen tomorrow.”  


Pearl felt his words resonate in her. She’d always found a way to hold back, take her time. It kept her from heartbreak but trapped her in idleness – maybe this was the right chance to take.  


“I’ll go if you promise polite conversation and no funny business – I need to keep something for the second date.”  


“Perfect” Leo grinned and tried to catch the attention of a waiter.

***  


Leo set about unlocking the door to the barbershop while Pearl continued to tell him about one of her friends. She’d gotten married not too long ago and Pearl had a laundry list of opinions on the subject.  


“She used to call to check in on me, make sure I’m doing well. Not sure if she’s paranoid or just lonely, honestly. Don’t blame her though – Nicky’s out all hours of the night and day, barely speaks to her. I asked if she thought there was another woman, but she thought I was mad, bless her. No, she thinks he might be sick, something serious. He won’t eat, pale as a ghost. But she’s always been a worrier. She needs something to keep her mind busy, that’s why she hung around Nick so much. Always big ideas that one. Usually half baked, and he’s a nervous wreck to boot, but she was always so proud of him. Frankly, I think he’s a bit delusional,”  


Leo mumbled something in agreement. Pearl took this as a sign to continue. “I haven’t heard from her in a few months, though. I know they were planning a holiday, somewhere warm I hope. It’ll be good for both of them to get some fresh air and sunshine.”

They had fallen into a rhythm of her explaining, himself listening. For all her bravado, Pearl rarely felt comfortable talking about herself, anything that mattered anyways. In a matter of hours she found herself gossiping about her close acquaintances to this man.  
They’d been standing at the door near on a minute, it seemed like Leo had several heavy locks to contend with. Must be making quite a profit to keep the place that secure, she thought. It’d be easy enough to break the glass, though.  


There was something about his air that begged her to trust him. He carried himself like a man who had survived a war, or buried a loved one, but there was a spark in his eyes that betrayed a fierce hopefulness. It was a far cry from her relationships back in school. At last, Leo coaxed open the stuck door with his shoulder. He entered, then stood to the side and gestured for her to come in. Pearl followed and squinted into the dark.  


“Sorry for lights – I’m saving where I can. My flat’s up the stairs in the back.” He gestured to the vague shapes in the back of the room, sparsely illuminated by the streetlights through the pane glass of the storefront.  
They walked to the stairs, Leo padding softly out of habit, and Pearl’s sensible heels clacking loudly on the tile. A loud crash came from somewhere below them.  


“What the hell was that?” said Pearl, she jumped a bit at the noise in the dark, and her heartbeat skipped.  


“Rats – they sneak in sometimes, can be quite a bother.” He raised his voice slightly at the end of his sentence, hoping his roommate was coherent enough to lay low for an hour or two.  


There was another crash, followed by a dense thump.  


“Sounds like a big rat,” Pearl exhaled, her heart rate slowing back down.  


Leo chuckled, but he sounded more nervous than he would have liked. “Would you mind waiting in the living room while I take care of that?” he waved to the steps leading down to the basement. “I’ll be much better company once I know there aren’t any critters running around.”  


Pearl frowned but agreed. Maybe standing in the dark in a strange man’s house she realized she’d already made a mistake, and would rather not offend her potential attacker.  


“Great,” Leo gushed. “Tea’s in the cabinet beside the stove, bottom shelf, and you can help yourself to anything in the pantry.” She could hear the slight edge of worry in his voice and chose not to say anything about how odd this all was. She gave a polite smile and ascended the stairs.

 

After a he heard Pearl open the door to the flat proper, Leo pressed his head to the banister and closed his eyes. What am I doing? he thought to himself. What risk am I putting this woman at? He heard more frantic struggling from the converted bomb shelter below. He knew that in helping his former captor, he was playing the long game. The goal of his initial proposal to help the vampire was simply to get out alive. He was tired, and hungry, and ruined. But he saw something in the creature’s dead eyes that kept him talking. Short term – survive; long term – well, he was still working on that. His mother had ingrained into him radical forgiveness, that accepting the sins of the past, wiping the slate, is what separated good people from the bad. He didn't know if it was true, but it was something to believe in.  


His father left when he was too young to speak, leaving him and his brothers penniless. Growing up was scratching and clawing to make a living, supporting his mother through illness and strife - battling the ripples his father left in his wake. But his mother always said he was forgiven. He was at fault, but putting her anger into hating him took away energy she could put into raising her children. He was violent and irresponsible, but he was human – and that was all one needed to deserve forgiveness. He wrestled with this throughout his youth, but it came to rest at his core after his mother passed. It was what he kept of her when he got on the boat to England, and what he kept of himself as he killed men full moon after full moon.

He reached the metal door half under the stairs and leaned against the frame. He wanted to give the captive a chance to speak first.  


“Hello, Leo.” The voice was hoarse and soft. “Who did you bring home?”  


“Her name is Pearl. We ran into each other last week and decided to give it a go. She’ll be leaving soon.” He could hear a strained groan through the door. “Are you alright? I can get you food or fresh clothes once I’m done with my date.” He put a smile on his voice, for both their sakes.  


“My collarbone is broken,” the man hissed. He was matter-of-fact, but hesitant. “I’ll need help setting it later.”  


“Jesus, Hal-“ Leo paused, “Give me second – I’ll get Pearl home safe then pop back.” He righted himself and dusted off his starched shirt.  


“Don’t – just don’t. It’ll take ages to heal anyway. Go talk to Pearl, I’m not going anywhere.” He sounded somewhere between bitter and resigned at this.  


Leo placed a hand on the door and nodded to himself. He was glad no one could see the doubt on his face. “I’ll be by in a few hours. Just – just try to relax,” he said, and jogged back up the stairs to enjoy his new company.

***

Leo figured he could take the chance of having someone over again since the transition to the basement. If he was being completely honest, it was a bit of a test run before he fully reopened the shop. Testing the waters one heartbeat at a time.  


They agreed that physical restraints would be necessary. This wasn’t the first time the vampire had tried to rework his lifestyle, and isolation would keep the body count to a minimum if history was anything to go off of. Leo was wary, but refused to waver in his resolution. It was clear that possessing authority, or feeling like he did, was tightly linked to Hal’s blood-soaked lifestyle, so Leo made a point to disrupt the dynamic, at least in small ways.  


He directed the stranger to a room, offered him clean sheets, played host. He never flinched or looked away when the creature hissed or laughed the same bone-chilling sound that haunted most of his nightmares. He was taking care of a boarder, offering rehabilitation. His energy was better spent enjoying freedom than reliving the past.

He was handcuffed to the radiator for a few months. It worked until it didn’t.

Customers had been coming in and out for weeks now, but something in the air must have changed. Leo had just placed a warm towel over his client's face when he heard a visceral snap. Leo learned later that the vampire had broken the bones of his hand by bracing his wrist against the sturdy pipe of the heating and stomping firmly on the joint. Leo scanned the room as he reached for a razor and found his housemate lurking at the foot of the stairs – eyes cold black. Leo would always regret his hesitation in the moment, because the next second he was unconscious, and when he came to, the damage had been done.

The fights had made him well-acquainted with gore, but the smearing of viscera across his workplace, his home, cut him deeper than he thought possible. It took away something he didn’t think he had left. The man whose beard he had intended to trim was in pieces – gutted like a fish. His head clung to his shoulders by a thin strip of flesh, all of the vital tubing, esophagus and windpipe, bared for the world to see. Still bleary-eyed, he stood in a daze and slipped in the red that coated every surface. He found the vampire curled in a corner, unconscious, or close to. Leo had never been this close to him before, and never once following any sort of – episode. 

There was chunks of the man under his nails and in his teeth, and the blood had begun to dry, matting down his hair. He wrist, previously shattered, appeared normal under the coat of red. The pallor Leo had come to associate with him had fled, replaced by the soft blush of stolen life.  


Quickly and without thinking, Leo rushed downstairs to the basement. It had been converted into a bomb shelter during the war, but currently sat idle, filled with cleaning supplies and canned food. Leo pushed boxes to the side and cleared out mops until there was standing room, then marched upstairs with cold determination. He gripped the vampire’s wrists and jerked him to a standing position. To Leo’s relief, he seemed to be in somewhat of a daze. He pulled the creature forward, supporting his weight as he stumbled and leaned over Leo’s shoulder. Leo was afraid to speak, concerned that his voice might break the spell Hal seemed to be under. He hurried toward the basement, his feet struggling for purchase against the filthy floor.  


As they reached the top of the stairs he heard the vampire intake a sharp breath, and cool air against his neck as the body braced against him shifted. “Looks like you missed a spot,” it hissed, leaning in to drag the flat of its tongue across the skin behind his ear where the man’s blood had collected while Leo lay on the floor. Leo didn’t think but reacted on instinct, turning to shove the creature off himself. Surprised, the vampire slipped back and fell down the first flight of stairs to the basement, cracking his head with surprising force against the landing. Hal lay there unconscious for one second, then two, before Leo finished the job.

 

Leo heard the other man wake up from outside the door. He had set about cleaning as soon as he was sure the door to the makeshift cell was locked and secure. Right away, Leo rushed up to main parlor and pulled the blinds down. The midday sun on the horrific scene was garish and almost comical in its absurdity; this was an act to be committed in the depth of night, cloaked in shame. With the threat of police intervention minimized, he took to his grim task. He would scrub and rinse the room upstairs for a few minutes, then check on the captive in the bomb shelter. He repeated this until the scent of bleach burned his nose and his knees were bruised.  


The dead man found rest in a secluded copse of trees by a small river miles out of town. It would take a while for his body to be found, and by then the moisture would have washed away much of the evidence, hopefully. Leo made sure he had his wallet with him, tucked into his undershirt so it would stay with him.  
Back at the scene – his house, he chided himself – he prepared himself to face the creature. It went as expected – fluctuating mood, anger, laughter – but in those few moments of clarity the scraps of man left behind thanked him for locking him away, and begged him for penance. It brought him back to those first few days on the run. They hiked through miles of countryside in near silence, both unsure and terrified of what was going to happen next. They leveraged a pair of train tickets – Hal claimed that it was far enough away from his coworkers he could convincingly go off the radar for a while. Now, sitting on a five-gallon bucket outside the bomb shelter, Leo realized he had forgotten the intensity of coming down off the blood; all that life evaporating, burning away moment by moment.

***

They got on the train two days after their escape. The moon was still bright and low in the sky, and Leo’s skin itched. He was already skittish and this wasn’t helping any.  


The man sitting across from him seemed jumpy as well, but less with a desire to flee than one to claw their fellow passengers apart. He tapped his fingers against the scarred armrest quickly, methodically.  


“Thank you,” Leo stated. Hal’s head snapped up to lock eyes with him, and Leo returned his gaze to the floor, then continued. “I owe you a great debt. But my offer – my offer is only that. If it’s not what you want, we can part ways at the next stop. I’ll forget anything I saw.”  


“You think I can’t do it, don’t you?” The man sneered. He leaned in and Leo could smell the rotten rust on his breath. “I could string up that woman from the ceiling by her entrails, and you think I can’t abstain a few days?”  
Leo glanced at the woman in question, gray-haired and half asleep, kitting in her lap. “I have no doubt you’re capable of immense cruelty,” he said coldly, leveling his eyes again, “Clearly.”  


Hal’s eyes softened slightly.  


“But if you’re looking to clear your karmic slate, then letting me go is sufficient. There’s no need to torture yourself.” Leo trusted Hal as a man of his word. Sly, brutal, manipulative – he was a master of those traits. But he also seemed like he was willing to follow through on his agreement, if only to an extent. Leo’s concern was pushing that extent too far. Hal leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.  


“I’ve done this before, you know. Played nice, tried to blend in with the local crowd.”  


The sound around the train became muffled as it entered a tunnel. The duo sat in silence a minute as the car slowed and dragged to a halt. The announcer appeared to notify them of a delay, and apologized for the inconvenience. Despite outward appearance, Leo could feel the tension rolling off his captor in waves. Leo stayed silent, observant, allowing the other man to come to his own conclusions. Leo had enough death on his conscious – he wasn’t about the provoke the creature into a violent spree.  


“I’ve always gone into it blind, so stubborn that the only approval I needed was from those that scoffed at my temperance.” He half-smiled at this, opened his eyes and glanced back at Leo. “I’ve let down everyone who ever thought I could separate myself from the thing that lives up here.” He tapped his temple.  
Leo could sense that a monologue was beginning, and maintained his quiet interest. Anything as long as it kept the creature occupied and distracted from the fact he was sealed in a room with a small crowd like fish in a barrel, in the dark, with no ways for witnesses to escape. Keep him busy, keep him safe.  


“I cut myself off from that cancer in me, that thing that endlessly consumes, to impress them, ultimately. I ignored it, hoping it would wither, but it’s become feral. The thing in me lurks in the dark until I bow to it, then it plays tame and sated. But to ignore it –" he crunched his eyes shut, pinning down the thought, “ – to ignore it is to ignore the tidal wave approaching shore. It’s always chasing me, and nothing I do can build the floodgate.” His stare was desperate, pleading for something.  


Leo thought this was all a bit melodramatic. He was a fucking serial killer. Granted, he didn’t have much of a soul to begin with, and there’s only so much fight one can put up against their own biology. The man before him deserved to be haunted, tortured by what he’s done. Maybe that’s why he keeps trying to get out, Leo pondered, finally he can wallow in self-pity, fully sober.  


“I understand having that other thing living inside you,” Leo offered. “I know what it is to have that thing rob you of what you care about, what you love.”  


Hal was hushed and stopped his tapping. Leo could notice the tremor in his hand that his restlessness had been disguising.  


“But you can’t use it as an excuse. I killed four men. When I had claws and fur I tore them to pieces, and I felt savage. It felt necessary.” He took a deep breath, extinguishing some of the anger and fear rising in him. “But I will not justify my actions. I stole their lives, and I deserve no forgiveness. But I must offer it to myself if I am to honor their memory, to make anything out of the life that robbed them of theirs’.”  


The train rumbled slowly and started inching its way toward the end of the tunnel.  


“I’m offering you a chance to build something new.” Leo kept his fear quiet. He’d become emotionally entangled with this psychopath. Hal may have the best of intentions – for the time being – but his conscious died centuries ago. The deal was no longer about survival, it had become a joint investment in becoming more than what their demons made them. He didn’t trust the vampire, but he had begun to have faith in him.  


The train pulled into the brisk night again, and Hal outstretched his wavering hand. Leo grasped in firmly, prepared to shake on their pact, but Hal brought his left hand to cover them both, clasped as though in prayer. “I swear I will keep you safe. I realize I’ve done nothing to make you believe I care a single iota about your preservation, but I need you to believe me.”  


“I believe you, Mr. Yorke.” It didn’t matter if it was true. If the monster believed it, they were both better off.  


The vampire smiled, by far the most genuine expression Leo had seen cross his face in days that wasn’t hunger or annoyance.  


“Just Hal is fine.”

***

They agreed that the bomb shelter was as good a place as any to keep him isolated. After that awful day, it became a semi-permanent residence. The door was padlocked from the outside, and an old bureau was stacked into a makeshift barricade. Leo offered to paint crosses on the walls, or douse the door in holy water, but Hal laughed, explaining he had the “psychic scar tissue” that rendered holy symbols useless. Great if you want to attend baptisms and weddings, but not so great for the attendees, he said, and offered a humorless laugh. Leo learned there were other “Old Ones”, some upper echelon of vampires that monsters had nightmares about. Leo nodded as though he was learning about his roommate’s black sheep uncles, attempting to assimilate this new terror without losing confidence. Leo needed a friend, but Hal need a confessor, a sink for all the bile in his blood. 

Leo got his social fix at work, absorbing hours of small talk while getting to know his customers. The previous owner had plenty of regulars who were surprised when a new face started greeting them at the door, but his easy nature and charm was reassuring. It took him several months, but eventually Leo began to talk about himself. He figured out quickly that the trick was to pick out the anecdotes that could stand sans context and lean in to the human aspects of his day-to-day. Sure, he couldn’t tell the man whose hair he trimmed why he took regular hikes through the local woods, but they could chat about local fauna either way.  


It was through this little channel to the outside world that he met Pearl. Everyone knew that he was a recent transplant to the town, and a perfunctory offer to be introduced to coworkers and friends was common, but rarely went anywhere. Leo appreciated the sentiment; he didn’t plan on acting on them anyway. He was far too busy managing the addict in the basement to go out for drinks.  


Pearl stormed through the shop doors on a rainy afternoon, clearly on some kind of mission.  


“Can I help you ma’am?” Leo offered.  


“My mother’s right, I’m a spinster already,” the woman huffed as she threw her arms in the air.  


“Pardon me, I was just-“  


“Oh, you don’t need to apologize, I’m just in a bit of a mood. I was on my back from the shops and the next great flood decides to fall from the sky, of course.”  


Leo laughed.  


“Do you mind if a wait a minute for it to ease up? These shoes are new and the leather is already coming apart at the seams.”  


Leo gestured to the scuffed chairs against the window where customers typically waited.  


“We’re not exactly bustling with business at the moment. Please, take a seat.” He grinned broadly, and Pearl smiled despite her herself.  
It took her a while to warm up, but she felt like the barber’s interest was genuine, and she didn’t have anywhere to be. Her frustration with the weather must have gone to her head, because she found herself deep in conversation with this relative stranger. They fell onto the topic of his recent time in London, and she saw his face fall. She reached for some anecdote to pull him out of whatever dark though had crossed him.  


“A friend of mine, Rachel, she’s down past the city, moved there recently too. Love her to bits, but she’s been in poor health lately.” The frown on the man’s face deepened. “Oh, God, nothing serious. I’m just trying to make conversation here – no sob stories yet.”  
Leo relaxed a touch, and gestured for her to continue. Pearl fussed with her hair and pursed her lips, slightly embarrassed, then went on. “She keeps saying it’s a cold, just something going around at her church, but I don’t believe it for a second. She’s been worried sick over her husband, poor thing. They were happy as daisies when they first meet, but then Nicky got a job higher up in the firm, and of course he took it, they barely managed to afford that house – extra rooms and all, hoping for kids, you know.” She paused her rambling a moment to sip at the paper cup of tea in her hands.  


Leo was glad she was generating the conversation; his was running out of socially acceptable topics shockingly fast.  


They sat out the rain for the better part of an hour, and agreed to meet again the week after. Leo would have refused but he couldn’t bear to let her down. Once he got a smile on her face he didn’t want to take the chance of inciting a frown.

***

He reflected on their chance encounter now, as he sat at the kitchen table, watching her pace around the room.  


“You can sit if you like – or leave if you’d rather. I didn’t have much of a plan inviting you back here,” he confessed. Pearl stopped and looked at him quizzically. 

“Honest,” he said, hands up in surrender.  


“I’m sure you have the best of intentions - I’m just trying to sort out what I’m doing here. This is the first date I’ve been on in months, did I say?” Leo shook his head no. “Well it is; I’ve been keeping to myself for so long, I’m just getting used to all this again.” She sighed, or huffed, rather, to emphasize her point.  


“Don’t worry about it,” Leo said. “I think I can at least connect with you there.”  


“I’m not driving you up the wall? I’ve heard I tend to be a bit forceful in conversation.” Pearl gave a fake grimace. It was clear she didn’t believe it herself.  


“Not at all. Besides, I’m not that interesting to talk about.” He gestured for her to sit. 

Her nervous energy was beginning to remind him of his roommate in the cellar, but for the time being, he had far more interesting company he ought to get to know.


End file.
